


A Time for Change

by Rachy



Category: PIERCE Tamora - Works, Provost’s Dog - Tamora Pierce, Tortall - Tamora Pierce
Genre: F/M, Goldenlake, Implied Spoilers for Mastiff ending, Most of the Breakfast Club make an appearance, Spoilers for Mastiff, slightly AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-01
Updated: 2018-07-01
Packaged: 2019-05-31 16:57:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15123845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rachy/pseuds/Rachy
Summary: Seasons change, and so does Beka.Written for Goldenlake’s Ficmas in June.





	A Time for Change

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Tamari](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tamari/gifts).



> Prompt 3: Beka/Rosto, disregarding Mastiff canon or imaging a different ending.

All Hallows’ came and went, and I remained unwed.

There wasn’t bitterness, or sommat as with Holburn, all fights and damaged pride. Just a fading. I’d seen it afore, with other mots or coves I was friendly with, heard of passion that swept you up til you thought of nothing but swiving and kisses, and then it burns out. Some folk make sommat of the embers that remain, for the babe that’s mayhap on the way, or find that they still make good companions and friends and find that love is enough. Mayhap Farmer and I will do the same. He still keeps my bed warm, more nights than not, but we’ve lost the scent that keeps the Hunt going, and I know not where to start looking again.

Sabine gave it words that I could not, when Goodwin and I had breakfast with her one morning in her rooms at the Palace. My lady has lost some of her cheer, but the sallowness of grief is easing from her face, the same way I know it eases from mine with every good meal and bathhouse visit I make. She tells me that she thought she knew how to adjust, that it was the duty of a knight to be prepared, and yet being back in Court again, with all the fawning and scraping and invites to services for the Gentle Mother, make her glad for the training courts and the sword dancing she does still with Aniki. She’s thinking of taking on a squire. I thought I knew how to adjust, too, but I lose what little I eat in the gutter afore training most nights. I try not to think of how I’ve walked these streets afore, of how I avoid rotating with the Dogs that make their rounds past his lodgings, the garden boxes wilting with naught to care for them, of how I am reaching the ranks of Dogs none will partner with. Goodwin is too good to me, kinder than she ought, and has held off giving me someone new.

My friends have been slow to warm to Farmer, and he has taken his lead from them. No one has said aught about leaping from one lover to another, but I fear they think it, and Ill of me. Rosto has not spoken to me of him, but I like not the look in his eyes whenever they meet.

On All Hallows, there are gillyflowers in a pitcher outside my door.

I take them, and leave them, as is only right, as an offering to the Black God.

.

By Midwinter, Farmer and I saw each other little. There would be enough action in the Lower City to keep any mot busy any time of the year, whether she wanted it or not. Treason in the Palace, and the slavery ban, and all of the other changes that the King and Queen had wrought on their nobles and Privy Councils still trickled down the Palace Way into the Lower City, and the longer time passed since the seal was stamped meant the closer the letter of the law was followed, and folk found that they couldn’t do all they had once.

I had asked Goodwin to make me free to my lord as much as he needed, and there was plenty of loose ends a Dog and her hound could chase until we caught our tails. She gave me no partner, and I asked for none, and on those scattered nights between Hunts with pairs of Dogs I walk with Ersken and Birch or Jewel and Yoav or those on Cesspool duty. As the Palace had sharpened their swords, so too has Rosto, and the heart of the City, once such a familiar rhythm, is beating to a tune just off kilter to my ears. The loss of Pounce is hard like this, and I catch myself speaking to empty air. Achoo gives me a quizzical woof, every now and then.

There’s a knock on my door at dawn, on the longest night of Midwinter, and I curse my way out of bed, having fallen into the comforting warmth only hours before. Ersken is there, paler than he was when we had left the revelries at the Dove, and softly tells me that a rusher tried to kill Rosto after we had left, and, unlike the other two since summer, had given it a very good try. He was well enough, but our Midwinter breakfast would turn into dinner, as Rosto was good only for cursing the healers.

I’m wearing a dress and my other finery when I arrive at the Dove that night. The dawn of the new year means gifts and celebrations, and breakfast had been postponed. I had spent the day with my family at my lord Gershom’s house, and it had eased something in me, to see they were still proud of me, and my heart was fit to burst to hear of their new roles in the Palace. Diona had even brought the cove she was courting to meet me. It had felt like it had when Mama was still alive, when we would still tease with love and affection, and it warmed my heart to feel so again. I had even had a long talk with my lord, which was always a comfort, and he had passed along a message from Sabine and their Majesties with well wishes for the new year. I take their well wishes for my friends upstairs, past the scattered few in the hall, and up into the rooms Rosto keeps. We eat in his sitting room, normal, but the laid table is empty, and I lay my gifts upon it. Achoo dances at my feet, smelling her favourite foods, and I shake my head at her, poking my head through the ajar door. Kora sits in a chair pulled up to Rosto’s bed, and she stands when she sees me.

“Happy Midwinter.” I say softly, and I kiss her cheek. She looks weary.  
“And to you. Is it so late?”  
“Only dusk. How is he?”  
“A poor patient. Aniki and I made sure he’d behave for a healer, and I sent her home at noon. She’ll need to be seen tonight.”  
I offered to sit with him while Kora went and readied for dinner, and noted the new cut arcing over his nose and heavy bandaging across his chest.

“You’d see the other cove.” Rosto whispered drowsily, and I offered him ale from the tankard. He drank it, wincing, and I reached around him to prop up his pillows.

“I don’t think you’ll have much of him left.” I replied tartly, and he closes his eyes with a smile.

“Always the same.” He states, his voice firm, and I meet his dark gaze when it holds mine. I sigh. Yes, the rusher has gone on to the Peaceful Realms at Rosto’s knives, but it is the one area where we don’t quarrel. If someone came at me with knives with the intention of ending my life, I fought for it. I expected no less from any of my friends, Dogs or Rats they may be. And I had no wish to face the loss of another I cared for.

“Was he the last of your challengers?” I ask, and listen when he describes how his politics stand, names not given. Rosto’s good for giving comfort, especially for a cove, and not just in gillyflowers. He’s better with knowing the right words to say, and I envy him for it, especially when I can’t do the same for him.

“I’m glad you’re not dead,” is the best I can manage, and when he laughs, I lean over and press on his shoulder. “I do mean it, you old looby.” His hand reaches up and covers mine, and in a foolish, mischief sparked moment, I kiss him. Unlike all of the kisses he’s stolen from me, I have the advantage, both of surprise and of his immobility, and there’s a satisfaction that I have in turn stolen a kiss. It’s not a short kiss, neither, because he’s warm and willing and not laughing anymore, and there’s comfort for me as well as him.

“What Crooked God’s trick was that?” Rosto asks slowly, his eyes sharp and warm.

“Midwinter luck. You need it.” I smiled at the look on his face, and went out to dinner.

.

Kora and Ersken wed the day after Beltane, and there is joy and merriment abundant in the Dove. Dogs and Rats alike have come to pass on their well wishes and join the celebration, and there is such a warm feeling in me when I look at their love for each other that it quiets all but the smallest of whispers of envy. Rosto plays his pipes and Kora and Ersken dance a reel, and I brush a small tear away. It’s the second wedding I have attended this week, Diona having wed her cove from the Palace, and I feel the same sense of pride, if not stronger, for my friends. They’ve made their peace with their different lives, and I’ve heard none here speak against the joining of a Dog and Rat.

Goodwin comes and sits on the bench with me, and I see Tom Goodwin speaking to Sabine a few tables away.

“They’ll do well together.” I say firmly before she has a chance to speak, and she nudges my shoulder.

“I would have said the same. We’d worried, at first, you and he were making the wrong beds to lie in. Not like that, for you,” she states, off the look I give her, “more sleeping in the doghouse and not the Kennel.”

“My lord says the best Dogs are all half crooked.” I mutter. “Mayhap this is my crookedness, to have Rats as such good friends.”

“You’ve been blessed to have them. I don’t like to think of the Chaos the City would’ve been, these past few years, without a strong Rogue with brains.”

“We would have gotten by.” I protest.

“Not with our lives.” She pauses, tapping her fingers against the finely embroidered shawl she wears. I don’t follow her thoughts. She shakes them off. “Bring your puppies to the Kennel tomorrow. I told my lord that the Lower City could do with another scent hound when you’re off Hunting, and the new Puppies could do with their lessons in behaving.”

She goes to Kora and Ersken and joins the crowd giving them well wishes and blessings, and Rosto sinks into the space she left.

“Weddings give a cove ideas.” He says darkly, smiling, and I laugh and give him the nudge Goodwin had given me.

“Don’t look to me.”

“I have looked, and you’re looking very pretty.” I look away from the warmth in his eyes and feel my cheeks burn. He flirts as he breathes.

“You don’t consider finding a mot and settling down?” I ask sharply. He laughs, but then stops and doesn’t answer.

“I’d not live well with myself. I’d have to trust a mot could hold her own, and trust she wouldn’t betray me. I’d not make a Queen of the Rogue, nor little Princes, for as not that’s where the next unhappy rusher would strike.” He stretches his legs out beside me, casual like. He doesn’t look at me. I knew he canoodled regularly with the mots, gixies and doxies of the Rogue that came to him, but they never came to breakfast, and only Aniki shared his bed with any regularity, and even that I think had faded. Family was meant to be sacred, but none with ambition held it so now.

“You’re not looking for a cove, Beka? While the Beltane fires still burn?” He drapes an arm over my shoulders and tugs me to his side, and I shrug free.

“I’m not jumping over no fires with you. You can have a dance.” I drag him up and we join the revelry. He’s a good dancer, and I do enjoy dancing.

In the early hours he plays chivalrous and walks me back across the street. When he goes to kiss me, I let him, and pull him closer. Weddings give a mot ideas, too, and happiness and affection are enough to overwhelm that little pang of loneliness. I still enjoy his kisses, too, and being in his arms reminds me of all the nice things about having a lover, the fire in my belly, the warmth, the tenderness of his touch, the feel of his skin under my fingers, my skin tingling under his lips. I don’t take him to my bed, but the searing kiss he gives in farewell leaves me burning with weak knees, wanting to call him back. He’s only raised a hand to me once, and never since we have become friends, and I’ve never heard of any mot that left him battered and bruised that had not pulled a knife on him first. I’ve learnt, too, that it’s not only rushers and Rats that turn to their fists in their homes, and my maps cover the wall where Holburn threw his tankard.

.

Achoo and I are taking our morning run around the walls the day of the fifth year since I became a Dog. Achoo is racing with Phelan’s mutts, slower than her usual speed, tongue lolling, and I pace myself to Phelan beside me. He runs with me sometimes, never at my usual speed, but he’s the only one of my friends that tries, having had practice with chasing Achoo everywhere her nose takes her. We pause so he can catch his breath before I carry on, and I pour water into the bowl I carry for the dogs.

“You looking forward to the celebration today?” He asks, panting.

“Mayhap if we got our badges all quiet like, with less fuss.” I reply. The thought of standing up in front of all of the Dogs and crowd is not as daunting as that day at the Palace, but my lord had hinted at something that kept me on edge. I’m proud to think of the bronze insignia I’ll wear, though.

“You’ve earnt it, Beka, and more. Think of what you’ve done in those five years, and you’ve survived. You know the odds of that.” I nodded as he waved, and trotted down the stairs.

His words stay in my head, flashing through the celebrations that follow. My lords’ smile when he presents me with the bronze tag, the pride on Goodwin’s face, the solid warmth of Ersken standing beside me, my hand gripping his, us the only two from our Puppy litter that have lasted through to here.

I’m admiring the shine of the flickering colours of the opal set dagger I was gifted by my friends when there is a knock on my door. It saves me from calculating the cost of the pretty weapon, and though I know Ersken received a similar one nearly as fine, I wish I had not admired it to Aniki. My friends are too generous by far. Rosto is at the door, all smiles and wicked eyes, and he gives me a small box, closing the door behind him.

“I’d’ve given it to you this morning, but we wagered you’d throw it at my face.” He leans against my desk.

I open the box, and close it again. A ring sits in it, a small and perfect fire opal, and I choke on my words and put the box out of my hands.

“When a cove gives a mot a ring, it means sommat.” Rosto says firmly, his eyes still wicked, and I stare at him in surprise, my mouth empty of words.

“It means we love you, we’re proud of you, we’re glad of your friendship, and we give thanks to all the gods and goddesses that you’re still here with us today.”

“That’s a lot for a ring to say. Thank you.” I tell him quietly. He rises and walks towards me, and my heart starts to race in my chest.

“I didn’t think you’d hear it just from me.” He replies, just as quiet, just as serious, and my hands are in his hair, bringing his mouth to meet mine and taking the words he would say from his lips. I didn’t need words, not when every touch spoke the truth, and soon they did not matter.


End file.
